Azerbaijan's Economic Role in the Middle Corridor: Transit Growth, Trade Diversification, and Infrastructure Capacity
The reconfiguration of Eurasian trade geography since 2022 has elevated the Middle Corridor from logistical infrastructure to an instrument of geopolitical positioning, with Azerbaijan occupying its central Caucasus node. This study assesses Azerbaijan's emerging transit centrality, hydrocarbon export dependence, and transit-infrastructure trajectory. Using secondary institutional and academic data (96 observations, 2019–2026), it applies a tiered evidence-credibility approach and a retain-and-flag protocol to examine transit growth, trade diversification, and infrastructure utilisation. Findings indicate sustained growth in corridor-freight volumes and Baku–Tbilisi–Kars railway capacity, including a fivefold post-modernisation capacity expansion and a roughly 2.5-fold increase in Persian Gulf/India-linked corridor volume.
However, the Q1 2026 East–West Corridor total did not reconcile with its reported sub-components. A cross-source comparability check also identified a substantial difference between the FY2024 hydrocarbon export-share estimate (≈87%) and an indicative share derived from Tier-1 data for January–April 2026 (≈58.1%); given the different reference periods, this is treated as temporal and definitional non-comparability rather than a directly reconciled discrepancy. For the Port of Baku/Alat, 2022 throughput relative to the subsequently reported nominal capacity yields a benchmark ratio of approximately 42%. Overall, the evidence supports Azerbaijan's expanding transit role and gradual trade diversification, while reporting inconsistencies constrain precise quantification. The study contributes an auditable, tier-differentiated evidentiary framework for assessing regional-connectivity claims without extending conclusions beyond verifiable evidence.
Copyright© 2026 The Author(s). This article is distributed under the terms of the license CC-BY 4.0., which permits any further distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Article's History: Received 29th of May, 2026; Revised 9th of July, 2026; Accepted 25th of July, 2026; Available online: 30th of September, 2026. Published as research article in the Volume XXI, Fall, Issue 4(94), 2026.
Salimov, S., Aslanov, E., Maharramov, S., Yagubova, N., Karimova, S., & Ibrahimli, M. (2026). Azerbaijan's Economic Role in the Middle Corridor: Transit Growth, Trade Diversification, and Infrastructure Capacity. Journal of Applied Economic Sciences, Volume XXI, Fall, 4(94), 1171-1190. https://doi.org/10.57017/jaes.v21.4(94).05
CRediT Authorship Contribution Statement: Salimov, S.: Conceptualization; Methodology; Formal Analysis; Writing – Original Draft; Writing – Review & Editing; Supervision. Aslanov, E.: Conceptualization; Formal Analysis; Writing – Original Draft; Writing – Review & Editing. Maharramov, S.: Methodology; Data Curation; Investigation. Yagubova, N.: Methodology; Formal Analysis; Writing – Review & Editing. Karimova.S.: Data Curation; Investigation; Visualization. Ibrahimli, M.: Data Curation; Investigation; Visualization.
Acknowledgments: The authors declare no acknowledgments beyond the publicly available institutional and academic sources cited in this study.
Funding: This research received no external funding.
Conflict of Interest Statement: The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
Data Availability Statement: The source inventory underlying this study comprises 96 observations derived from publicly available institutional, governmental, and peer-reviewed sources. The cleaned and tier-classified Source Inventory used in the final analysis is provided as Supplementary Material accompanying this article.
Ethical Approval Statement: Not applicable. This study relies exclusively on publicly available secondary data and did not involve human participants, personal data, animals, or experimental procedures requiring ethical approval.
AI Disclosure Statement: Generative AI tools were used solely for grammar editing and proofreading of the manuscript. All research design, data selection and classification, analysis, interpretation, and conclusions were performed and validated by the authors.
Aliyeva, R., & Aliyev, F. (2025). Economic assessment of transport and logistics system's contribution to national economic growth. Economics of the Transport Complex, 46, 233. https://doi.org/10.30977/etk.2225-2304.2025.46.233
Bayramov, S. V., Mehdiyeva, G. Y., Eyvazov, A. A., & Mustafayev, E. R. (2021). Diversification rate of energy balance and energy export demand risk impacts on economic growth: The case of Azerbaijan. Cuestiones Políticas, 39(68), 290–314. https://doi.org/10.46398/cuestpol.3968.18
Belur, J., Tompson, L., Thornton, A., & Simon, M. (2018). Interrater reliability in systematic review methodology: Exploring variation in coder decision-making. Sociological Methods & Research, 50(2), 837–865. https://doi.org/10.1177/0049124118799372
Dadaşlı, R., & Valiyev, O. (2024). Debating on transport corridors of Azerbaijan in the context of globalization. Universal Journal of History and Culture, 6(1), 1–20. https://doi.org/10.52613/ujhc.1411712
Donaghy, K., Beheshtian, A., Zhang, Z., & Brown-Steiner, B. (2021). The coevolution of commodity flows, economic geography, and associated nonpoint source black carbon emissions in the Midwest–Northeast transportation corridor of the United States, 1977–2007. In Transport and the Environment (pp. 47–62). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78555-0_4
Emanet, H. (2021). The present and future of Baku-Tbilisi-Kars Railway. In International Conference on Eurasian Economies (pp. 359-364). Eurasian Economists Association. https://doi.org/10.36880/c13.02553
Gawliczek, P., & Iskandarov, K. (2023). The Zangezur corridor as part of the global transport route (against the backdrop of power games in the South Caucasus region). Security and Defence Quarterly, 41(1), 36–53. https://doi.org/10.35467/sdq/161993
Hajiyeva, L. E. (2025). Azerbaijan's logistics and economic importance of the Middle Corridor. Tikintinin İqtisadiyyatı və Menecment, 3(32), 89-95. https://doi.org/10.58225/tim.2025-3-89-95
Hajizadeh, E. (2014). Role and importance of transportation corridor Baku–Tbilisi–Kars. BM. https://doi.org/10.36962/eh08
Ibadoghlu, G., & Bayramov, I. (2023). An assessment of the potential of EU–Azerbaijan energy cooperation and its impact on EU gas dependence on Russia. Foreign Policy Review, 16(1), 91–108. https://doi.org/10.47706/kkifpr.2023.1.91-108
Ismayilov, R. A., Guliyeva, T. S., & Mammadov, H. V. (2025). Analytical analysis of the current situation and development prospects of the Southern Gas Corridor. Nafta-Gaz, 81(9), 618–624. https://doi.org/10.18668/ng.2025.09.06
Jafari, N. (2024). Toward an analytical technique for evaluating alternative East–West supply chain routes through Azerbaijan (pp. 1–4). https://doi.org/10.1109/PLMO62307.2024.10887143
Khan, S. A. (2025). Trans-regional integration and connectivity in Central Asia: Strategies of Russia, China and European Union. Economic Diplomacy, 3(1), 61–73. https://doi.org/10.2478/ecdip-2025-0005
Mikail, E. H., Çora, H., & Çora, A. N. (2020). Azerbaijan's energy resources and BTC project. Open Journal of Political Science, 10(2), 163–184. https://doi.org/10.4236/ojps.2020.102012
Miroshnichenko, O. F., & Oginskaya, A. E. (2019). Methodology for calculating financial result for the owner of the infrastructure from increasing carrying capacity of the direction during operation in cars with increased capacity. Vestnik of the Railway Research Institute, 78(1), 33–40. https://doi.org/10.21780/2223-9731-2019-78-1-33-40
OECD. (2024). Further regional economic and trade integration is key to the route's long-term viability. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. https://doi.org/10.1787/e45ca803-en
Panahaliyeva, M. O., & Aliyev, S. T. (2018). Strategic objectives of diversification of foreign trade turnover of Azerbaijan in the global world. Theoretical & Applied Science, 57(1), 209–219. https://doi.org/10.15863/tas.2018.01.57.35
Sarwat, R. (2025). The impact of transport corridors on the economic development of Azerbaijan. Economic Journal Publications (ECO), 1(8). https://doi.org/10.71447/3005-2696-2025-1-8
Valieva, S. (2021). The historical features and topical problems of increasing Azerbaijan's export potential. Voprosy Istorii, 156–163. https://doi.org/10.31166/voprosyistorii202109statyi49
Vardomsky, L. B. (2023). International transport corridors in the context of developing Russia's transit potential. Regional Research of Russia, 13(1), 65–76. https://doi.org/10.1134/S2079970522700575
Yermekbayev, A., Delovarova, L., & Kaliyeva, A. (2024). Trans-Caspian International Transport Route: A Kazakhstani perspective on challenges, opportunities, and prospects. International Journal: Canada's Journal of Global Policy Analysis, 79(2), 312–329. https://doi.org/10.1177/00207020241257636
World Bank. (2023). Middle Trade and Transport Corridor: Policies and investments to triple freight volumes and halve travel time by 2030. World Bank. https://doi.org/10.1596/40626